Season 5 Casting, News and Speculation V 7 [show spoilers, book spoilers past OP]

[Guard of the Rainking]

Yes, but you will note that even this quite compressed timeline has the election in episode 2, not 1. Which is, IMO far more reasonable. Episode 1 election proposals simply seem delusional. When has the show ever had such a major plot point in episode 1 without the slightest bit of seasonal set-up first?

However this timeline assumes we will actually get Winterfell and for the Watch in season 5. While this seems to be forum consensus I am really not so convinced. I think it is a possibility, not a given. It might be worth considering where the season will go if we consider that for the Watch might happen in season 6, episode 2.

The Baratheon General character in a Nutter episode is not enough to convince you?

[Hippocras]

The Baratheon General character in a Nutter episode is not enough to convince you?

There is a battle in the North in season 5, yes, but that does not necessarily mean it is the one at Winterfell. It might be, yes, but people should consider the other possibilities:

Deepwood

Hardhome adaptation

Show specific Dreadfort or other preliminary attack on Boltons

[Guard of the Rainking]

There is a battle in the North in season 5, yes, but that does not necessarily mean it is the one at Winterfell. It might be, yes, but people should consider the other possibilities:

Deepwood

Hardhome adaptation

Show specific Dreadfort or other preliminary attack on Boltons

Could be, but I still think that Winterfell's in this season.

[Hath4]

The baratheon General could just be a character at the crofters village when theon arrives there after escaping winterfell. I think the battle of ice will be early in season 6. I think the Bolton stannis winterfell arc will end with theon escaping with farya and ending up being captured by stannis and reunited with yara.

[ADanceWithCats]

E1: Denys, Cotter arrive, discussions of elections. Stannis offers Jon Winterfell. Mance burned.

E2: Election hubbub, Jon elected at end. Sam, Davos sent off.

E3: Stannis leaves. Restructuring of the NW/Wildlings. Val stuff.

E4: Mel Stuff, Mance is Alive! Mance to Winterfell.

E5: Fetch me a Block.

E6: News of Hardhome. Cotter Pyke sent to Hardhome.

E7: Skipped

E8: Some more restructuring business. Things are looking good. Hardhome happens.

E9: News of Hardhome, fin hits the shan.

E10: Punk Letter - FortehWatch

Haha, this is interesting for me to see (all predictions to me are). My version of what I want to see is definitely more lightweight:

E1: The election. The election is the set-up this season: it sets up Jon's new circumstances.

E2: 'Atmospheric' talks. Specially, Melisandre with Aemon, Jon, Stannis; Sam with Aemon, Shireen. The second episode serves as the second set-up episode of the season. So, while a lot of other arcs are set-up, we get a bit of atmosphere for this one.

E3: Stannis leaves. The Winterfell infiltration unit leaves. Jon makes some decisions. Some sort of a war counsel - decisions taken.

E4: pass The lack of an episode in the storyline serves to denote the passing of time.

E5: Jon makes more decisions (letting wildings in through the Wall, sharing food with them). There is some grumbling about this, especially on the part of Janos. More set-up.

E6: Master Aemon dies, Sam and Davos are sent off. Jon is losing moral support.

E7: More grumbling from the Watch. Jon executes Janos, which seems to have the desired effect - his authority is reestablished. False season climax.

E8: WW attack on the wildings. Call it show!Hardhome, if you will.

E9: pass This episode would have important stuff on the Stannis front.

E10: For the Watch. True season climax.

This structure has the most important beats of the storyline (Jon making decisions and losing support and authority), has a nice fake climax and does not really delve on extraneous matter (Mance lives? dies? Oh, a wizard priestess did it... really, what is it with all the fake deaths in AFFC/ADWD...)

[Arkash]

If it were me writing, I'd feature the Wall in every episode, if only for a short dialogue scene. There are so much characters I wanna see interract. Imo, we need those scenes :

- Jon / Melisandre, at least 3 head-to-head scenes between those two.

- One or two war councils before Stannis leaves.

- A Melisandre / Aemon (+ Sam ?) would be perfect !

- Aemon / Sam / Shireen / Olly in the library.

- Jon / Selyse / Melisandre / Shireen in the second half of the season.

- And at least three NW only scenes. Fleshing out some minor watchers to give a face to the protest and more screentime to Edd.

- One Jon / Stannis only dialogue would be a good idea as well.

- We also need at least two scenes to flesh out some new wildlings.

Anyway, considering the amount of scenes this arc will require, I hope the Wall will feature in every episode !

[Guard of the Rainking]

If it were me writing, I'd feature the Wall in every episode, if only for a short dialogue scene. There are so much characters I wanna see interract. Imo, we need those scenes :

- Jon / Melisandre, at least 3 head-to-head scenes between those two.

- One or two war councils before Stannis leaves.

- A Melisandre / Aemon (+ Sam ?) would be perfect !

- Aemon / Sam / Shireen / Olly in the library.

- Jon / Selyse / Melisandre / Shireen in the second half of the season.

- And at least three NW only scenes. Fleshing out some minor watchers to give a face to the protest and more screentime to Edd.

- One Jon / Stannis only dialogue would be a good idea as well.

- We also need at least two scenes to flesh out some new wildlings.

Anyway, considering the amount of scenes this arc will require, I hope the Wall will feature in every episode !

Tormund and Edd would be great as well.

[Arkash]

^ Yeah, great point ! I really want to see them interract now !

A Tormund / Aemon moment could be good also ! Like Tormund thanking the old maester for patching him up.

Aemon has a lot of people to interract with in great ways : Jon, Sam, Melisandre, Stannis, Shireen, Selyse. I really hope they make great use of Peter Vaughan this season ! And they maybe could even go deeper than the books on his thoughts on Melisandre and prophecies.

[xanman]

And anyhow, McElhatton has said that Roose will be up to "dastardly" things in s5. If his already dastardly acts haven't made him well-known enough, then his future ones should.

(He also rocks a lovely Santa hat from time to time).

My FB cover photo has been Roose with a Santa hat all month :cheers:

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xpa1/t31.0-8/10498134_10103178571374313_7341781230230195621_o.jpg

[Steelborn]

E10: Punk Letter - FortehWatch

Omg, I can't wait for this :rofl:

[boojam]

I'm still hoping for Jon to send Tormund out from the wall to bring in Val and the rest of the wildlings , the opposite from the novel, but I can see that working .

I don't know about Val, but I think the whole 'Wildling Exodus' thru the Wall will probably ultra super abbrivated in seasson 5, may even take place off-screen.

That does bring up the question about Tormund and even Mance , it hard to prognosticate what the Wilding-Stannis-Black Watch story will be. The whole fMance/glamored-Rattleshirt/'execution' is left as a kind of scrambled what-the-hell story in Dance the resolution of which is off in Wow. They may push that out or skip it.

The Mance of the show seems on a different footing with Jon and Stannis.

Between Stannis roaming the North and Roose in Winterfel and Jon at the Wall there is a hell of lot of story to fit between other the Westeros and a bunch of Essos this season.

(We seemingly will have three Essos story locations, for a while, never had that many before.)

No wonder Bran's left out!

This is going to be the worse 100 lbs of story stuffed into a 5 lb visual drama bag we seen.

[Hippocras]

People insisting on the election in e1 do realize that it was Stannis who originally let the wildlings pass the wall right? Not Jon? It is rather a significant detail IMO, along with Mel forcing them to "burn their gods" in order to pass.

Jon's election e1 would mean it is his decision to let the wildlings pass and no god burning. Which removes the period of power vacuum when Stannis was able to establish himself at the Wall.

Sometimes I really don't get the things that people are SO upset the show changes, while they gladly ignore several other details that matter far more long term. Without the dynamic above, There is no difference in the show between Stannis and Jon from the wildling perspective. Or worse, the wildlings would continue seeing Jon as simply someone who betrayed them. The fact that Jon carved out a middle ground in the books with a significant difference in approach towards the wildlings than Stannis was quite important for the loyalty they later began to develop towards Jon.

[ADanceWithCats]

If it were me writing, I'd feature the Wall in every episode, if only for a short dialogue scene. There are so much characters I wanna see interract. Imo, we need those scenes :

[...]

Anyway, considering the amount of scenes this arc will require, I hope the Wall will feature in every episode !

Tsk, careful. People will start saying you want fanfic.

(I agree with you that I'd love a lot of dialogue/interaction scenes. Perhaps not in every episode - I think that Season 2 was the last one that tried that, and that didn't go well and started to feel perfunctory after a time - but, honestly, any combination of Jon/Sam/Aemon/Mel/Stannis/Davos/Mance (also Shireen, Selyse, Tormund) has such potential... I'd love the Lightbringer convo from ADWD Jon... III, I think? Anything about the 'blood of kings', about what being a king really means in the setting... and so on, and so forth. Even Sam and Davos can bond, over family and fatherhood...)

I have a feeling that the Wall can take the place of King's Landing as being the 'chatty' location this season.

[WhitewolfStark]

Haha, this is interesting for me to see (all predictions to me are). My version of what I want to see is definitely more lightweight:

E1: The election. The election is the set-up this season: it sets up Jon's new circumstances.

E2: 'Atmospheric' talks. Specially, Melisandre with Aemon, Jon, Stannis; Sam with Aemon, Shireen. The second episode serves as the second set-up episode of the season. So, while a lot of other arcs are set-up, we get a bit of atmosphere for this one.

E3: Stannis leaves. The Winterfell infiltration unit leaves. Jon makes some decisions. Some sort of a war counsel - decisions taken.

E4: pass The lack of an episode in the storyline serves to denote the passing of time.

E5: Jon makes more decisions (letting wildings in through the Wall, sharing food with them). There is some grumbling about this, especially on the part of Janos. More set-up.

E6: Master Aemon dies, Sam and Davos are sent off. Jon is losing moral support.

E7: More grumbling from the Watch. Jon executes Janos, which seems to have the desired effect - his authority is reestablished. False season climax.

E8: WW attack on the wildings. Call it show!Hardhome, if you will.

E9: pass This episode would have important stuff on the Stannis front.

E10: For the Watch. True season climax.

This seems like the most practical of predictions, and IMO the most likely to come to pass.

This structure has the most important beats of the storyline (Jon making decisions and losing support and authority), has a nice fake climax and does not really delve on extraneous matter (Mance lives? dies? Oh, a wizard priestess did it... really, what is it with all the fake deaths in AFFC/ADWD...)

Fake deaths are a staple of fantasy genre and the romance mythos per Northrop Frye. It goes back to the view that the mythos has with death--that death isn't the end but the beginning of something else entirely. The Romance mythos is the one in touch with the spiritual world and idealized planes of existence such as Shambala/Shangrila, El Dorado, etc. In such idealized places one never grows old or meets death as a friend at the end of a very long existence. Death is seen as reversible in the mythos of Romance for this reason. The Fantasy genre took up this mantle and along with it the concept of death being reversible--which lends itself to bringing the idea of "fake deaths". The question thus becomes how does one satirize such "fake deaths"? One way to make something a satire is to have an overabundance of it to point out the ridiculousness but this is more meta-humor.

To make such fake deaths "ironic" of course is to have "coming back from the Dead" mean that the person isn't the same person who they were, which is an ironic iteration of having so many people die and come back to life (because normally when a person comes back to life in fantasy or romance, they come back the same person they were before or "powered up a notch"--thus to have the person come back "less than they were before" would of course be an irony on the "powered up by death" trope).

Just some musings.

[The Reckoner]

You're stretching out the election.

E1: Jon sits in on Stannis's discussions with Mance and Tormund. Jon is offered Winterfell. Jon is elected Lord Commander. The actual election can be pared down to Jon vs Slynt...Slynt favored for his connections to KL, Jon for his ability to command and keep cool under pressure.

Boom. That's all that is necessary. Stirring up anti-Jon sentiments won't be that hard. D and D showed us how some of the wildlings play to the Northerner stereotype with the Thenns' rampaging about, butchering Potato's parents, attacking Mole Town. Now the NW sees Jon letting more wildlings through, and is even talking of giving them land to settle. The kindling was laid with the Thenns. The spark is struck when Jon decides to let the wildlings through. They could even have some NW object to Mel's religion, see her spending time with Jon, and develop further anti-Jon sentiments. All over the course of the season.

[boojam]

You're stretching out the election.

E1: Jon sits in on Stannis's discussions with Mance and Tormund. Jon is offered Winterfell. Jon is elected Lord Commander. The actual election can be pared down to Jon vs Slynt...Slynt favored for his connections to KL, Jon for his ability to command and keep cool under pressure.

Janos Slynt is getting the Big Haircut S5E1.

[sj4iy]

Janos Slynt is getting the Big Haircut S5E1.

God, I hope so.

[AdmiralKyrd]

I never realized how huge Wendell's mer-pin was until today. It's like they were definitely trying to make it stick out. It gives me hope for Wyman.

http://25.media.tumblr.com/55a527313789f5a5fb5c34bf4fef978d/tumblr_mnt3b5j4Jn1qeijvdo2_250.gif

[ctid1977]

I gave up hope for Manderly a couple of months ago and have remained mired in a slough of despond ever since.

[AdmiralKyrd]

I gave up hope for Manderly a couple of months ago and have remained mired in a slough of despond ever since.

I don't see how you can give up hope for something when there has been zero evidence to suggest it won't happen other than lack of evidence in confirmation.